Asklemmy

Is the FDA good or bad?

This is a false dichotomy.

Are they a necessary evil?

Framing things in moralistic terms just further obfuscates things.

The FDA is an enormous organization. It contains contradictions. It contains multitudes. Yes it is in a variety of ways compromised by the capitalist class, but that doesn’t mean the entire enterprise is without value. Black and white thinking isn’t going to cut it here.

Should they be thrown in a volcano and remade?

If you remade the FDA from scratch under capitalism, the result would be roughly the same, because the structures of political power would still be the same.

Let say, hypothetically, a regulatory agency like the FDA, lets 50% of bad thing get approved.

Well what happens without the FDA?

100% of the bad things will be legal to sell.

So do you still want an FDA even if they are corrupt and let 50% of bad things go through?

And the FDA lets way less than 50% of bad things go through (I don't have an exact number tho).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Food_and_Drug_Administration provides some historical context.

You can also read The Jungle by Sinclair

Without the FDA, you're going to get sawdust in your bread and worse.

Ideally the FDA should not be swayed by business interests, but everything controlled by our government is. That said, you want the FDA to exist and protect us from bullshit snake oil products and keep corporations from lacing our food with cheap poisons and carcinogens.

Trump gutting the organization makes it go from "could do better" to "actively subverting its own purpose."

That statement is there because the company selling that milk is advertising that it is rBST free. It is illegal to make health claims for a product without proof and it can lead to large fines and forced product withdrawal. The disclaimer protects the company from any false advertising claims.

Remember that the stories you hear are always going to be the ones that are most controversial, otherwise they would not be news. The day in day out work of the FDA is enormous and most of it, I believe, necessary for the level of trust in what you find on the shelf, what you're doctor recommends, what your pharmacist hands you, that we enjoy.

I don't want to have to know my farmer, my chemical compounder, my importer, my distributor, my restaurant chef, etc, etc, for every stupid thing just to avoid eating lead or feeding hepatitis to my kids.

The loudest complaints-- selling raw milk is technically illegal? they allow red food coloring as long as you list it in the ingredients? they may or may not allow you to call oat liquid a "milk"?-- sound pretty small to me, and also even these issues are reviewed and discussed more or less transparently in response to people's concerns.

FDA is intrinsically good but currently does its job below expectations. Doesn't mean that it's bad, just means it's not doing enough. And without FDA, things can and will get significantly worse. Things can always get worse.

It's innately good, but currently it's swayed by corporations to allow things that are questionable. Corporations want it gone so consumers have no protections and they have the ability to use any cost cutting processes, harmful or not. Think hydroxychlroquine and Ivermectin during covid. Things like sugar pills could be sold as a cure for hypertension and people will die.

Your ability to question anything Trump says is a good thing. Usually, just go by the opposite of what he says.

Is the American FDA perfect? Of course not. but them existing is a net positive because without them your food would have literally no safety standards in the US. Even if theyre corrupt and incompetent they can still be a net positive when compared to just letting companies put cat piss in your koolaid if they want to.

I was told - but I never fact checked it - that the FDA actually has less than 10 employees. Everyone else is an outside contractor. And if it is true, I do think it needs better organization.
If an agency that has to protect all consumers is organized this way, that's really worrisome.

had never looked up rbst but doing so right now and right from the start here's this.

i assume tho that the profit from rbst milk caused the FDA to overlook something like that. Anyway, this is my point. When the FDA states something, i just assume they are doing it to sway the public for the sake of allmighty capitalism; and that them specifically going out of their way to say something actually implies the opposite is true.

Good. Next question.

As bad as Trump is, being not-Trump does not equal good. Politics in the US is not a bad/good, Trump/not-Trump binary. Even if the two political parties in power would like the masses to believe it.